Hawaii, Day Post-One: HI to CA, Plus Cats

I left Hawaii on Wednesday morning, flying direct from Kona to Oakland (since that airport is much closer to my brother than SFO). Because of the destination, I was flying Southwest (I had flown United from SFO to Kona), so it was my third airline of the trip.

I'm not a huge fan of the airport in Kona--I always have trouble finding my way around (where is the agriculture inspection? could they put up a sign or something?), and because it's all outdoors, I get very hot when dressed for the chill of the plane instead of the weather outside.

Anyway. The Southwest boarding process went as smoothly as I had been told it would, and I found myself a window seat not too far back. Unfortunately, I did turn out to be behind someone who, despite having one of the few empty seats next to him, still felt he had to recline his seat into my space. Which is so rude I can't even stand it.

Anyway. Out comes the knitting!

I was a bit surprised that they don't have screens in the seatbacks. 

They let you stream shows and movies to your device, but honestly, since that assumes that you have a device (not everyone does), and that it's a size you want to watch a movie on (my phone? not a chance), and that it's charged, I don't really approve. I could have watched something on my iPad, of course--this is more a theoretical complaint than a personal one. I listened to an audiobook and went on knitting.

Goodbye, Hawaii.

Also did some reading on the iPad, while eating the snack box that they handed out to everyone.

World's smallest package of tic tacs.

After a long, long stretch of nothing but this:

Finally, land was in sight.

Container ship?

Hello, California. Nice to see the mainland again.

See the bridge, shining in the distance, like a ghost?

My brother met me at the airport, and we got my checked bag (it made it! again!) and went to the BART station, where he pointed out the sunset behind me. Quite pretty!

We took the bags to his house, where the cats were an enthusiastic welcoming committee, sniffing everything very thoroughly. (From here, it's all cat photos, if you're not in the mood for that much cute.)

The two youngest (they're almost a year) were the most into it.

But the middle child also had to see what was going on.

And the senior boy was curious too.

Not only did the suitcase smell fascinating....

But I hung my jacket over a chair, and they quickly discovered that it had dangling cords that made excellent cat toys.

Inside the bag, also full of smells!

They were all over it. Literally.

And the airbed was a surprising but fun play space!

We went out and got dinner at some point in there, but it was basically the cat show for the evening, which suited me fine.

Next up: a day of rest, and a night heading home.